A 9-year-old student took a school board to task over its apparent 180 on a policy barring teachers from displaying Black Lives Matter posters.

The student, who only identified herself as "Novalee," said she saw posters of Black Lives Matter and Amanda Gorman on her teacher’s wall at Lakeville Elementary School. The presence of these posters, she said, contradicted what the school board said at a prior meeting: "no politics in school."

When she cited a school board policy prohibiting Black Lives Matter posters in the district’s schools, the principal allegedly told her that the school board members were the ones who made the posters.

"I am nine years old and I know that," she said. "You expect to believe that you did not know what you were doing when you were making these posters? C’mon people!"

Pacaso, founded in October by executives from the real estate company Zillow, aims to do to second homes what Airbnb did to hotels and Uber did to taxis. It targets luxury neighborhoods slightly off the usual tourist trails.

Critics say it changes the nature of a neighborhood; the company insists it is making exclusive communities more accessible and, by allowing eight people to share ownership of one home, reducing the intense demand on housing stock.

I know this is going to sound like a nonproblem at first, but there is a deeper issue that troubles me. Our 16-year-old son is an amazing kid: intelligent, hardworking, and athletic. He is a straight-A student who juggles multiple AP classes with a demanding sports schedule. He is one of the top three students in his class and is also being recruited by college coaches for his sport. But ever since he was in elementary school, we’ve had the same experience at the end-of-year awards ceremonies: He’ll occasionally get recognized for the “objective” awards, like honor roll or scoring the highest on foreign-language tests, but he has never won a single “subjective” award, the ones selected by teachers/coaches or voted on by his peers. When he was little, we would console him by saying “Don’t worry, just keep working hard and maybe you’ll get one next year!”

But after several years of that, we changed our message, instead emphasizing that hard work is its own reward, and that we are proud of him for his diligence and work ethic. I suspect one of the reasons he gets so little recognition is his personality: He is extremely quiet, introverted, and serious. He has a handful of close friends but gets along with everybody; his school tends to be a bit “clique-ish,” but he is one of the few students who has good friends among both the “smart kids” and the athletes.

I’m not concerned about the awards themselves or about him impressing anyone else. Now that he’s older, he tends to brush it off as no big deal. But I just watched him sit through yet another awards ceremony with a forced smile on his face and tears in his eyes as every one of his friends at the table got a special award from one of the teachers or coaches. He sometimes comments about feeling “invisible” because he doesn’t have the charm and charisma of some of his peers. We’ve tried telling him that sometimes teachers like to reward students for their effort since the students who excel in class already get the reward of good grades. But this doesn’t feel right either, especially after seeing him come home exhausted from a three-hour sports practice and then stay up till 1 a.m. studying.

After 10-plus years of this, I can’t help worrying that maybe we should be giving him different advice—instead of preaching self-acceptance, perhaps we should be telling him to adjust his personality, so he is a bit more likable? He is headed to college soon, so maybe I should do nothing and let him figure it out himself?

—Mom of the Invisible Man

As the nation cracks down on group activities so close to the Thanksgiving holiday, Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, has told Oregon's residents to call the cops if they see coronavirus violations.

“This is no different than what happens if there's a party down the street and it's keeping everyone awake,” Brown said in an interview Friday. “What do neighbors do [in that case]? They call law enforcement because it's too noisy. This is just like that. It's like a violation of a noise ordinance.”

“Oregon is on a steep and stark slope of rising coronavirus cases,” said Patrick Allen, director of the health department. “But we aren’t powerless in the face of this virus. Because it depends on us to slow the spread. Your choices make a difference.”

Dear Amy:

Recently, I noticed that the 13-year-old daughter of some close friends has been posting sexually provocative photos of herself on Instagram.

This is a public account, and strange men make sexual comments on her posts and she responds with lewd remarks that couldn’t be printed in a family newspaper.

I find it alarming, and so I notified the girl’s mother (who’s not on social media) and she thanked me for speaking up, but she also gave an excuse along the lines of “she’s just precocious.”

Meanwhile, the content continues. I think this is dangerous for the girl, but I also feel like it’s in the parents’ hands now. Is it right to continue to stay silent, once I’ve said my piece?

While Trader Joe's says it plans to change some of the names and packaging of several of its ethnic food brands, the grocer said it doesn't believe the names are racist.

The company says it has been labeling some of its ethnic foods with variations of "Joe" for decades, including Trader Ming’s, which is used to brand the chain’s Chinese foods, Trader José's for Mexican foods, "Arabian Joe” for Middle Eastern foods, “Trader Giotto’s” for Italian foods and “Trader Joe San” for Japanese cuisine.

Trader Joe's rebuffed reports that a small Change.org petition calling on the company to "removing racist packaging" was what prompted officials to take action.

"We want to be clear: we disagree that any of these labels are racist," the company said a new statement shared with USA TODAY on Tuesday. "We do not make decisions based on petitions. ... If we feel there is need for change, we do not hesitate to take action."

A sign at the entrance of a metal-cutting shop in Kentwood, a suburb of Grand Rapids, asks customers to “remove your mask or raise both hands high” to avoid being mistaken as a robber.

The sign in front of Tubergen Cutting Tools Inc. reads “In responce [sic] to Gretch, attention: This facility is protected by armed employees for your safety! Remove your mask or raise both hands high and keep um up! Don’t be mistaken as a robber! Thank you, management. Open carry still welcome.”

Two Disney World fanatics who live-streamed their trip to the Orlando theme park's reopening over the weekend are receiving intense backlash for vacationing amid a pandemic and continuing to explore the park after one fell ill.

YouTuber Tonya Blakey, known as That Crazy Disney Lady to her 9,500 subscribers, streamed over 10 hours of footage of her trip to the Magic Kingdom on Friday and Saturday. In the videos, she and her friend, Robin, wandered the grounds, rode Splash Mountain, and experienced a brief health scare.

An emergency proclamation requiring face masks in stores and restaurants in Stillwater, Oklahoma, was nixed after store and restaurant owners received threats.

The proclamation was issued Thursday. Among other things, the order made businesses require patrons to cover their faces to combat the spread of coronavirus.

But on Friday, Mayor Will Joyce softened the rule to encourage, not require, face coverings, after several reports emerged of employees being verbally abused and being threatened with physical violence while trying to enforce the order -- all in just three hours of the rule going into effect.

"Many of those with objections cite the mistaken belief the requirement is unconstitutional, and under their theory, one cannot be forced to wear a mask. No law or court supports this view," said City Manager Norman McNickle in a statement. "It is further distressing that these people, while exercising their believed rights, put others at risk."

McNickle went on to explain the importance of face coverings in preventing the spread of coronavirus. The masks have been recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Oklahoma State Department of Health.

A Manhattan woman who flew on an American Airlines flight from Miami to LaGuardia says she was shocked that the flight was packed full — and about half the passengers did not wear masks despite the coronavirus pandemic.

Most Americans are opposed to protests against stay-at-home orders and other coronavirus pandemic lockdown measures, according to a new poll.

The latest survey by Yahoo! News and YouGov found that 60 percent of the U.S. public opposed protesters calling for an immediate end to social distancing measures and stay-at-home orders designed to protect public safety.

Less than a quarter of respondents (22 percent) said they supported the rallies calling for America to be "reopened" while a further 18 percent said they were "not sure" how they felt on the matter.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is urging the NYPD to be more aggressive in breaking up large gatherings, including funerals, as people continue to flout social distancing guidance rules.

On Monday, he announced he was increasing fines for individuals caught breaking the rules from $500 to $1,000 and said it was 'everyone's responsibility' not to be reckless.

New York is seeing its curve flatten - the death rate is slowing for the first time in weeks and while the number of cases and infections is still growing, it means social distancing has been effective until now.

Cuomo has extended the state-wide lockdown on non-essential businesses until the end of April and is telling people not to become 'over confident' because of the new figures.

Faculty and staff at the University of Kansas sent a letter to the school's chancellor, calling for a boycott of Chick-fil-A on campus over the company's stance on LGBTQ issues, according to The Hill.

Over the summer, the university allowed Chick-fil-A to open a location inside the student union, and entered a contract agreement with the company to sponsor the "Chick-fil-A coin toss" at home football games in coming years. Faculty and staff have protested Chick-fil-A's support of organizations "hostile to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer LGBTQ people, families, and communities."

Hell Factory

At a Facebook content moderation facility in Tampa, Florida, contractors working for Cognizant are regularly subjected to traumatizing, unsanitary, and dangerous conditions — that in at least one case literally led to a death.

The contractors, who review as many as 200 flagged Facebook posts per day depicting animal abuse, sexual abuse, murder, and other horrifying acts, are subjected to hellish work conditions. That’s according to an investigation by The Verge‘s Casey Newton that reveals how tens of thousands of people spend their days exposed to the very worst that the internet has to offer.

A Frontier Airlines passenger was removed from a flight and arrested following a confrontation with a flight attendant after she complained about vomit in her daughter's seat. A video was shared online Wednesday showing the incident that took place Saturday on the flight from Las Vegas to North Carolina.

Rosetta Swinney said her flight to Raleigh-Durham had already been delayed so staff could clean the plane but when she boarded the plane, she noticed her daughter’s seat was still dirty.

"She jumped up to say mom! ‘My hands are wet,’” Swinney told local media WTVD-TV. “She smelled it. She says 'this is vomit, mom.' So we went to look. It was on the bag, all over her shirt, her hands.”

The 53-year-old said she told the flight attendant about it but her requests were ignored following which she had a confrontation with the crew. Following the confrontation, the airline called authorities who handcuffed the woman. Swinney's 14-year-old daughter was heard crying in the video as she watched her mother getting arrested.